brilliant fall weather had been varied at times with misty days and nights; and during the Half-Moon's inland voyage her course had lain through scenery singularly wild, grand, and lonely. She had passed the long line of frowning, battlemented rock-walls that we know by the name of the Palisades; she had threaded her way round the bends where the curving river sweeps in and out among bold peaks,Storm King, Crow's Nest, and their brethren; she had sailed in front of the Catskill Mountains, perhaps even thus early in the season crowned with shining snow. From her decks the lookouts scanned with their watchful eyes dim shadowy wastes, stretching for countless leagues on every hand; for all the land was shrouded in one vast forest, where red hunters who had never seen a white face followed wild beasts, upon whose kind no white man had ever gazed.

Early in October, Hudson set out on his homeward voyage to Holland, where the news of his discovery excited much interest among the daring merchants, especially among those whose minds were bent on the fur-trade. Several of the latter sent small ships across to the newly found bay and river, both to barter with the savages and to explore and report further upon the country.

The most noted of these sea-captains who followed Hudson, was Adrian Block, who while at